I LOVE them with one caveat. As a newbie knowing there is a pot at the end of rainbow is super exciting. I’m super analytical (my wife hates it), so I look at their income report and then scrub their website/ emails sent through their list to figure out HOW they did it.

The one caveat that I wish more bloggers would include is expenses.

It does me no good seeing someone saying they made $3500 on Bluehost when in reality they spent $2400 on Facebook ads or used an affiliate service so their profits really was 1100. Way more transparent.

One of the reasons bloggers quit before the first year is they never peek behind the curtain or never connect the dots. They see huge income reports and think I’m a failure because I’m not there. What they fail to realize is that those bloggers are networking, paying for ads, building connections and creating affiliate partners that help pitch their product.

They need to add something to the conversation, provide valuable information for other bloggers, and not replace better content. I think they are definitely appropriate for a blog like yours! But there are lots of blogger that publish monthly income posts in the personal finance field, so I wouldn’t choose to do that on my site.

As a blogger I’ll occasionally read other people’s income reports to learn a few tips and tricks about how to make it in the blogging world. I find it encouraging to read about other bloggers having success.

However, I’ve decided not to publish income and traffic reports for my blog for a couple reasons.

It’s not what my readers want. (I’m assuming this, of course. My blog has only been live for a month, who knows what they really want. Or if they even exist.) I assume those who visit my site are there to learn about personal finance – not about page views.

If my blog were about blogging (like yours), then sharing site traffic and income makes sense. It’s proof of authority.

What bugs me most is when it crosses the line into a heavy-handed or semi-misleading sales technique. Too often, I see bloggers who say straight up “It’s easy to start your own blog.” That’s true, but they leave out “…but it takes a ton of hard work to make money from blogging.”

I know this sounds a bit rant-ish. I hate to sound like an old curmudgeon. You know, the ole’ “get off my lawn” type thing. Overall, I don’t mind income reports when done tastefully.

I like income reports. They’re motivating and informative. I like to gauge how other bloggers are making their money. In my opinion, they have their place in the blogging community, but I’m sure they’re not enjoyable for most readers.

As someone who is new to blogging, I have found the monthly blog reports to be very inspiring. I don’t read them all anymore, but it was great to see the financial growth so many different bloggers were able to achieve. It opened my eyes to possibility and opportunity, always a cool view!

(Pete’s notes: me thinks this: Income Reports are more useful the EARLIER you are in your blogging journey, yes?)

I haven’t read a ton of these but the ones I have read I don’t really find that helpful for a number of reasons:

For people in my niche, they are often not specific enough to guide what I might want to pursue (e.g., “$XXX from affiliate income” vs. “$XXX from my affiliate contract with Bluehost that is a mix of 500 ongong clients and 8 new ones.”). I would especially find helpful the new and reoccurring client info because that lets me know how much readers value that product now.

I think I would actually prefer quarterly statements or year over year statements. Blogging is seasonal so let me compare an April to an April vs. an April to a September. And with a quarterly summary, it can even out a product lunch that inflated income and visitors.

Maybe I am being naïve but I am enjoying blogging for me. I want people to read my blog and I want to make money from it but I think I would do it anyway if those things never happened. Income statements make me question the satisfaction I get from just hitting “publish.”

If more than 20% of it is copy and pasted from the previous month, I hate them. If you are sharing original content and REAL business insights and it’s simply delivered as an income report, I absolutely love them.

nooooo income reports are great! it’s something to relate to and take inspiration from, also a great way to spark a convo. The only time I don’t enjoy them is when the income is super huge as its no longer personal or relatable.

(Pete’s note: Rosemarie Groner’s income is also totally unrelatable, but she decided to publish OTHER blogger’s reports that ARE relatable for her audience. Brilliant.)

I think they’re really helpful because not only do they give you an idea of how much blogger earn, but I also find them very motivating, it’s easier for me to see myself in the future earning that kind of money.

But for me, they can be useful if done correctly, but I do not think monthly reports are useful once you hit like 10k/month as it becomes either so far out there that people get this idea they can do the same easily. Or for people who have been around awhile, it becomes oh well I bet they spent 5k as well on costs. Just my two sense.

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Our all-time favorite monthly blog reports

Note: Some of these have very little to do with blog income, but rather traffic, marketing, etc!

Those insights are actually more relevant to more bloggers, as some bloggers seriously couldn’t care less about replacing full-time incomes.

Why it’s awesome: The exact same reason Ms FAF’s is. She goes deep into her traffic stats and sources, and generally just produces incredible fun and engaging content.

These two were on the podcast as well, found here. Might seem like I’m just plugging podcast guests, but that’s because I am. They give extremely valuable income reports. So they deserve to be plugged.’

Reader Interactions

Comments

I enjoy reading monthly reports but in all honesty used to have a slight addiction & got a little lost in the sauce when it came to looking at everyone’s income.

I still enjoy reading them & i’ve gotten massive value from bloggers sharing their monthly stats but sometimes those 6 figure a month incomes make it difficult to focus on the value within the rest of the post because that number is just so astonishing to see typed out. It feels like this super almost unattainable thing yet its always within the context of someone telling me “you can do it too” so you really don’t know how to feel sometimes!

This was a great post! I agree with pretty much everything everyone else said.

I do think that if you have some good strategies to share with other bloggers, you should do a monthly report. One of the reasons I started blogging was to help other people solve problems and if I can help just one person, then I’m happy.

That’s one of the reasons I love helpful, detailed blogging reports like yours, Pete. Keep up the good work! 🙂

Revenue depends on how much you like/dislike blogging and what else is going on with your life that makes it worth it/not worth it. Because all this is work…type type type, socialize, type, heart, stats, seo, graphic, type type, share.

I’m bored to death, night owl and lazy so blogging is pretty perfect for me.

Haha, love “see other bloggers making serious cash from their RV somewhere…” – Are there other RVers who post income reports? 😛

I took part in this survey, and I’m glad to see the results! I think income reports are great if they are helpful. There are a lot of unhelpful ones out there. I pride myself on my income reports – they are usually around 4,000 words and full of actionable tips and help. I wouldn’t be where I am today if it weren’t for income reports when I first started my blog (I started just as a hobby and didn’t even know that blogs could make money).

Thanks for including me! And it’s pronounced Key-Win-Awe ->Keweenaw, a beautiful peninsula in Michigan’s upper peninsula, and the name of one of my dogs 🙂

And, based on your audience, I’m not too surprised people weren’t super negative about blog income reports. When I was just a reader of blogs, they were not very interesting, now, they *can* be helpful. I also never enjoyed case studies as a reader, since they didn’t align greatly with my journey, now that I’m writing I enjoy them a lot more.

I wish I would have seen this poll back when it came out, I probably would have had some comments.

Personally, I stopped reading the blog posts. In fact, there was one blogger that I used to really enjoy but I unsubscribed altogether when the income got to be well over six figures per month. It just seemed all of a sudden that a blogger that once was a peer was now kind of on a different plane. Now, don’t get me wrong, the blogger in question didn’t brag but when it’s that much money per month, it kind of comes across that way no matter what.

Now, when I see a post about blog income in my feed I generally just skip it. It’s valuable to them but with my limited time that I have to read the great posts that others put out there, those just aren’t worth the time for me.

Hi Pete,
I also took part in the survey and have enjoyed reading what other bloggers think about income reports. I’ll be looking at Michelle Schroeder-Gardner’s more closely now for her tips. Inspiration + mentoring = income reports full of helpful tips and guidance. Yes, very useful for a newbie blogger!

Thanks so much for the shout out, and especially for your comment about my blog name – that meant a lot because I agonized over picking a name, lol.
Kathy

Personally I am ambivalent about them. On one hand, they are super motivating; they give me a glimpse into opportunity and instill hope in my heart that all the hard work I put into my blog may someday payoff. On the other hand, they piss me off by showing me that I can’t possibly compete with these mega-bloggers who have the best camera equipment, the best photo studios, the best props, and all the money in the world for marketing and then there’s me who is totally operating at a loss month after month because I have yet to make more than a few bucks on my blog.

Great post! It’s interesting how many of us bloggers actually find it more useful than not. Personally, I like that it sort of makes me feel like I can always do more, so I never just become complacent.